Re: WINDOWS users of Tidy: roadmap feedback requested

Hi Jim,

I will preface this with this is just a reply from a mainly
/WINDOWS/ person... it is just "in my opinion"...

Re: POSIX compliant

First I was surprised about the netmarketshare link. I do not
know how they gathered the information but if I read it correctly
some nearly 90% of the world is Windows. Full stop.

And Unix, Linux, Mac OS, others account for just 10% or so!!! Very
interesting indeed, if true...

So why are we talking POSIX compliant? Just for that 10% or so?

Why does the other 90% not count as a quasi standard of some sort?

Re: Windows XP

Next I would categorize support for Windows XP as WANTED and
NEEDED.

I still run an XP machine, mainly because its hardware may not
support later Win versions. But it runs perfectly, and runs some
utilities and tools that I did not want to buy, install again
elsewhere. It does its job...

And while I know XP has been EOL'd, I note there are still
occasional MS updates for it... Apparently they also feel they
can not totally abandon this base...

I would however agree that maybe we should **not** need to support
earlier than this like say ME, or heaven forbid Windows 95.
But OTOH, as indicated earlier up-to-the-present tidy has had no
special requirements, so would probably compile and run...

Tidy certainly still compiles fine in my XP, using MSVC8 (2005).

It is a shame I do not still have MSVC6 (1998?), but think Tidy
would still compile and run...

Re: POSIX positional parameters (PP)

Well, as suggested above, I would **not** see chasing a standard
supported only by 10% as a "good citizen" act, despite understanding
that that 10% can be very **noisy**, vociferous even, argumentative over
the so called "standards", which I will **not** get into...

And I try hard to take all the MS knocks very quietly... Not because
I think them right or wrong... just that potentially 90% of my user
base might use that system...

Now while I understand these PP's may be needed if we needed say to reverse
any adjective+noun in other languages, and perhaps other phrase ordering,
but does tidy's warnings and error messages have any where this would be
used, needed?

Some rough stats usually help. Of the 444 msgs ids, only some 90 have PPs,
and most of them with just 1, which can not be swapped. And I see none
of the paired form "%1$s %2$s", but I did not do a complete analysis, but
will in time, if needed...

And even if there are, could not another phrasing be just as good?

So at this point in time, I would suggest tidy simply does **not** need
positional parameters!

Now, I will **not** argue the point on this. If someone feels it just
has to be that way, then ok, go for it... I do not want to stand in the
way of perceived **progress**, perhaps despite some lost windows support,
or at the very least some special WIN32 only code...

But will always be left wondering WHY?

Remember again, this is just my personal opinion!

Regards,
Geoff.

Received on Monday, 25 January 2016 20:11:04 UTC